


Blood in the Waves

by tastewithouttalent



Series: Coefficients [2]
Category: Katekyou Hitman Reborn!, Psycho-Pass
Genre: Biting, Blood, Bruises, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Developing Relationship, Dom/sub Undertones, Dubious Consent, Guns, Hair-pulling, M/M, Masochism, Physical Abuse, Rough Sex, Sadism, Topping from the Bottom, Unhealthy Relationships, Verbal Abuse, Violent Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-16
Updated: 2015-12-07
Packaged: 2018-04-27 15:49:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Underage
Chapters: 8
Words: 11,860
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5054647
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tastewithouttalent/pseuds/tastewithouttalent
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Squalo wishes that he could hold onto the anger longer. It's warming, soars through him like fire and electricity at once, like his sleeping blood is coming alive to flash and flare and burn, a phoenix turning itself to smoke too soon." Squalo spends his life on the fringes of the System without a reason to rebel. When he's seventeen, he finds his reason.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Follow

There’s a hierarchy of sorts among the System’s edge cases. Squalo learns it well over the years of adolescence, between medication he never takes and the therapy sessions he never attends; there’s a game to play, a balance between mental health and bragging rights, the risk of how long you can hover at the line between double digits and triple, how long you’ll let yourself linger in the hundreds before downing the next dose of medication. Some people brag about it, Squalo knows; he hears them, on the peripheries of his awareness, kids who say they were kept home three days straight and walked to their sessions by the Bureau’s robotic assistants, gangs who claim to have hid from the sensors for hours at a go before lowering their Hues just enough to pass the Dominators when the Bureau finally caught up to them. Squalo only ever hears them secondhand, whispers that die nameless as he draws into earshot, because no one competes with him. He has a reputation, won through violent bursts of fights that leave him with bruised knuckles and a Hue purged clean by the sudden rush of viciousness, until even the Bureau’s scanners can’t pick him up as anything other than perfectly, purely stable, until the Dominators turn themselves into the scarlet mark of acceptance even as the frightened silence spreads in waves over a crowd too afraid to speak against him.

Squalo wishes that he could hold onto it longer. The anger is warming, soars through him like fire and electricity at once, like his sleeping blood is coming alive to flash and flare and burn, a phoenix that turns itself to smoke too soon. Without it he’s cold, ice and chill and dull, nothing like bright enough to show up on the System’s sensors. It’s like sleepwalking, like fumbling through existence without a compass to guide him, reaching for something --  _anything_  -- to guide his forward motion.

He’s seventeen when he finds it.

He’s two days after his last lurching moment of full existence, one of the bright spots in his life that feel farther and farther away with each gap before the next one. The lulls feel endless, exhaustingly infinite, and he’s halfway to home and going slower with each step when a figure rounds the corner of a block ahead of him, stepping out of the shadows and into the afternoon sunlight until the illumination clarifies on dark hair, broad shoulders, a coat that looks too heavy for the lingering heat in the air. Squalo blinks, his steady forward motion halted; and the person turns to stare at him, eyes flashing dark and hot with rage.

“What are you looking at?” the man asks, his voice so low Squalo can feel it rumble in the pavement under his feet, can feel it lance up into the gaps between his veins to spark him into life. He can see the crimson behind the other’s dark eyes even at this distance, the same red as in the Dominators too stupid to recognize Squalo as what he is turned into something pure and vicious and  _alive_ , heat enough to tear through him and leave him scoured-clean and hollow.

The stranger doesn’t look away. He keeps staring, eyes dark and expression clear of interest or alarm or anything at all except for that  _hate_ , objective and hot and  _pure_ , Squalo’s never seen anything so condensed before. Squalo’s heart is thudding in his chest, the world going brighter by the moment like flames are catching at the dry edges of his existence, and he would swear he can feel his Coefficient climbing higher like it’s responding to the burn of those eyes.

“Who are you?” Squalo asks, finally, his voice coming out loud as a shout over the gap between them.

The other’s expression doesn’t change. There’s no narrowing of his eyes, no softening of his mouth; he just keeps watching, shoulders hunched forward into the threat of relaxation that Squalo’s never seen in anyone else, has barely even felt in himself. “Xanxus,” the man says, grating the hard consonants into gravel in his throat, and then there’s a high electronic whine, the flaring blue of a sensor locking into place.

“ _Please remain stationary_ ,” a woman’s overly-gentle voice echoes along the street. “ _Representatives from th--_ ”

Squalo didn’t see the gun in the man’s hand. Xanxus just moves, his arm extending up and out, and then there’s a burst of sound, the flare of a contained explosion as he fires, and the speaker crackles itself to silence, the electronics too thoroughly shattered by fast-moving metal to continue their familiar lilt. Xanxus grunts, a wordless note of satisfaction, and looks back at Squalo as he lowers the gun back to be lost in the shadowy disguise of his coat.

“You should go,” Squalo growls, even though he knows this is pointless information, probably unnecessary and certainly unwanted. “The Bureau is stupid but they’re fast enough to be here in a few minutes.”

Xanxus huffs, a sound that might be intended as a laugh and just sounds skeptical. “Don’t tell me what to do, scum,” he says, but then he’s moving after all, drawing closer as he strides down the street with a gait heavy with grace.

“Hey,” Squalo says, turning to track Xanxus as the other man moves past him. “Where are you going? There are more Scanners down that way.”

A pause, a dark head turning to glare at him. Xanxus’s hair catches in front of his eyes, shadows the crimson into almost-black. “You think I care?”

Squalo doesn’t think. His blood is hot, flying through his veins faster than it ever has before, and he knows that his Coefficient is climbing, can feel the lulling effect of routine swept away like dust by a storm, leaving him shocking, startlingly alive, and what he says is, “I’m following you,” a statement rather than a question.

“I don’t care,” Xanxus says again, a growl of sound carrying more information in its tone than in its meaning, and keeps walking.

Squalo follows him.


	2. Indecent

The building Squalo follows Xanxus to is old, crumbling itself into disrepair just outside the border of the Scanners in the city center. Squalo isn’t sure what it was before; a factory, maybe, an apartment complex perhaps, something huge and sprawling from the early days, before the city began building itself up into narrow spires instead of out into the available space around it. What it looks like now is a ruined castle, collapsed outer walls framing an interior structure in somewhat better repair, even if the glass in the windows is long-since shattered into fragments that sparkle in the afternoon sunlight.

“This way,” Xanxus growls as he leads the way down a hallway and moves into the shadowy center of the space. It’s the first words he’s spoken to Squalo since he turned his back on the other; his voice purrs itself into resonance, expanding to fill the space like he’s leaving his prints on the walls. It makes Squalo’s blood run hot but he doesn’t say anything, just keeps following Xanxus at such a close stride he would kick the other’s dark boots if Xanxus slowed his pace at all.

He doesn’t. He keeps the steady rhythm of his stride through the mostly-intact hallways, past open doors with a various array of furniture in them; Squalo glances but doesn’t linger, more interested in following the breadth of Xanxus’s shoulders to wherever their end-goal is. It’s a room, as it turns out, larger by far than the others Squalo has seen; the electric lighting that must have been here is gone, shattered or torn out long hence, but there are candles set on most of the available surfaces, wax melted down to stick them to a table or a counter or a metal holder, the drips cooled against the smooth floor underfoot. Xanxus strides across the floor to a chair by the wall, the frame of it heavy and glowing with the promise of expense; Squalo can’t imagine where he got it or how it ended up in this place somewhere between decadence and desolation. When Xanxus turns to slouch against the wood, he makes it look a throne.

“Scum,” he says, words vibrating in his throat to set flame to the very marrow of Squalo’s bones, the resonance a magnet drawing on the iron in his blood. “What do you want?”

Squalo scowls, confusion turning itself into irritation, anger coming easy on the fire in his veins. “Weren’t you listening?” he says, hands curling themselves into tension at his sides. “I’m going to follow you.”

“I don’t need you,” Xanxus says. He braces an elbow at the arm of the chair, leans sideways to rest his head against the support. He looks bored, his expression slack with disinterest except for his eyes: those are dark, catching into shades of crimson when the light hits them, flaring into flame for a moment before cooling back to coals. “Make a toy of yourself to someone else.”

Squalo’s cheeks go hot, temper surging through him. “I’m not here to be a  _toy_ ,” he spits. “I’m here to be a  _weapon_.”

“You said you want to follow me,” Xanxus says, level and raw and deadly. “If I say you’re a toy that’s what you are, scum.”

Squalo opens his mouth to respond, to snap some further protest, and Xanxus goes on, talking over him without a trace of even noticing his intent to speak. “Or you can get out.” He slides farther down in his chair, his knees spreading out into the space; he looks enormous, larger than life, like his casual presence is expanding to crush out Squalo’s existence in the room. “Go back to the damn city.”

“The city can go to hell,” Squalo spits. “I never belonged there in the first place.”

“I don’t care about where you  _belong_ ,” Xanxus says, his voice dipping into something low and thrumming with an unspoken threat. Squalo can feel his spine prickle with the awareness, the danger in the air crushing against him and spiking his heartbeat faster, forcing his breathing into a rush in his chest. “If you want to follow me you do what I tell you to do.”

Squalo can feel the growl start in his chest and rumble against the inside of his ribs to come spilling past his lips, the sound of frustration made completely futile by his own decision. In another situation, for another person, it would be protest, it would be rejection; but here, in the ruins of what feels like a castle, in front of a man he barely knows, it tastes like surrender on his lips.

“I can be  _more_  than a toy,” Squalo finally manages, wrapping the words around the broken-glass irritation of his desperate, illogical  _need_  to be here, to feel the fire of real life in his veins. “I’ll burn the city to the ground for you.”

Xanxus unfolds from his chair, his limbs collecting themselves back into that feline grace as he comes across the floor. Squalo doesn’t flinch away when Xanxus steps into his personal space, and if he hisses at the too-tight grab of a hand against the back of his neck he doesn’t offer any more protest than that. His hands, ever before his preferred instruments of violence, stay slack at his sides, even the initial tension of anticipation fallen loose with the totality of his submission.

“Turn around,” Xanxus says, and Squalo does, turns his back on the shadows in those eyes and the lingering frown at that mouth. Xanxus pushes him, hard, steering him forward by the uncomfortable hold he maintains at Squalo’s neck, and Squalo stumbles across the room, shoved into movement towards one of the other few pieces of furniture, a couch as ostentatiously opulent as the chair in the corner. Xanxus pushes him around to the back, his hand forcing Squalo down, and Squalo has two choices: either drop to his knees against the floor or fold at the hips to tip himself forward over the back of the couch like an offering.

He chooses the latter. It’s easier to catch his balance with his hands against the back of the couch, feels like less of a submission to keep on his feet, and it seems to be enough to satisfy whatever it is Xanxus wants of him. The hold at his neck lifts away, Xanxus shifts the position of his feet, and Squalo has a quick flush of premonition before Xanxus’s hands are back on him, shoving the edge of his shirt up to bare an inch of skin above the top edge of his pants.

“I’m not just a toy,” Squalo says to the wine-red of the couch, staring at the rich color of the fabric while Xanxus’s hands find the front of his jeans, push the button open and drag the fly down with a casual disregard that is still stunningly efficient. Squalo takes a breath, swallows back the heat in his throat; everything feels hazy, impossible, like this might be a hallucination or an overly vivid dream, like he might wake up back in the dim-light space of his bland apartment, trapped in the routine of a pointless life, forced into an existence too small for what he could be, what he  _needs_  to be. His body prickles with the fear of that, the first fright he’s felt since he turned on the sidewalk to trail Xanxus’s shadow, and he must shudder because Xanxus growls behind him, grabs at his hip to brace him while his other hand dips under the edge of Squalo’s clothing and shoves down against bare skin.

“I can be your weapon,” Squalo says, letting the words purr into a promise in his throat, and Xanxus’s touch pushes over his half-hard cock, calls a surge of heat to his body in immediate, reflexive response. Squalo hisses, hips canting forward to buck against Xanxus’s fingertips, and Xanxus hums something meaningless but for the satisfaction in the sound, pulls his hand sideways and away so he can shove Squalo’s jeans off his hips and halfway down his thighs instead. The air in the room is warm but Squalo’s skin is hotter, radiant; he feels like he’s glowing as Xanxus’s hand fits between his thighs to force his stance wider, to spread his feet apart and balance his position low against the back of the couch.

“Who said I needed a weapon?” Xanxus asks from behind him. The hold at Squalo’s hip vanishes, fingers tangling into his hair instead; when Xanxus yanks Squalo’s head tilts back in instinctive desire to ease the pain at his scalp, his throat drawing taut on whatever answer he might have made. His back arches into a curve, his body straining on the tension, and he’s hard against the back of the couch, the unstated promise of Xanxus standing behind him enough to set all his body on fire. “I never asked you to follow me.” There’s a wet sound, slick and messy; it takes Squalo a moment to place it, to identify the catch of moisture as fingers slide past lips, as skin going wet as it presses against a tongue.

“I don’t need  _permission_ ,” Squalo spits, his tone raw and rough and all out of keeping with the tension in his chest, with the anxiety for friction starting to thrum through his thighs and puddle low in his stomach. “It doesn’t matter if you don’t want me, I’d follow you anyway.”

“Yeah?” Xanxus says. His hold on Squalo’s hair shifts, steadies, and there are fingers sliding spit-slick against the other’s entrance, threatening the intrusion Squalo’s heart is racing for. “You’re not very obedient, scum.”

“Fuck you,” Squalo says, working his fingers against the back of the couch into a better hold, a better angle to brace himself against the push that’s coming. “You don’t have anyone  _else_  following you.”

Xanxus doesn’t answer. There might be a growl, might be a hum of agreement; Squalo’s not sure and doesn’t have time to decide which before Xanxus pushes against him to force a pair of slick-warm fingers inside him. Squalo tenses against the burst of friction, a shout of response spilling from his throat, but Xanxus’s touch just dips deeper inside him, stretching him open in spite of the shudder of reaction running through his legs and cramping in his shoulders.

“Better no one than someone useless,” Xanxus says, his words sounding distant and contemplative as he twists his fingers and pushes his touch in against the inside of Squalo’s body. Squalo’s choking for air, can’t find the calm to take in a full breath, and his heart is hammering in his chest and he’s hot and desperate and  _furious_ , arousal and rage spilling into an incoherent tangle in his blood.

“I’m not  _useless_ ,” he insists as Xanxus draws his hand back, draws the stretch of his touch away before he starts to slide back forward. Squalo braces himself against the edge of the couch, shoves hard backwards to meet Xanxus’s motion, and for a moment his words evaporate into a groan of sensation as every nerve ending in him fires at once.

“I’ll do anything,” he says as Xanxus shoves him forward with the weight of his hips, starts to fuck him open with his fingers in earnest as Squalo’s body eases around his touch. “I’ll fight, I’ll kill, whatever you want, I’ll make the streets run red with blood for you.”

“You think you can,” Xanxus says, a question or a taunt or both, and Squalo groans a retort and satisfaction at the same time as Xanxus’s fingers thrust into him hard enough to white out his vision for a moment.

“I can do anything,” he says, and it’s reckless and it’s stupid and he doesn’t care, it all tastes like absolute sincerity. In this moment he could do anything, with fire in his body in place of blood. “I could take down the entire Bureau, dismantle the System, make the city yours like it should be.”

“I never said I wanted the city,” Xanxus growls. His fingers angle wider, draw another hiss from Squalo’s throat.

“Fine,” Squalo manages towards the dim-lit ceiling that’s all he can see with the way Xanxus is tilting his head back. “We could  _destroy_  the city instead. Whatever you want, I’ll get it for you.”

“Shut up, scum,” Xanxus says. His hand slides free, leaving Squalo empty and chill and aching, and then his hold on the other’s hair goes too. Squalo is left to tilt his head forward and gasp for air over the sound of Xanxus undoing his pants behind him. “You talk too damn much.”

“Fuck off,” Squalo says, trying to resist the urge to rock backwards, trying not to think about the sound of a metal zipper clicking over itself, trying to ignore to the slick sound of Xanxus licking over his palm. There’s a rustle of fabric, a hum of expectation, and Xanxus’s hand is back at Squalo’s hip, pinning him against the back of the couch while slick heat drags over Squalo’s skin, lines up against him to frame the outline of a promise. Squalo chokes on a breath, his cock flushing aching and hard with anticipation, and Xanxus pushes forward into him, the width of his cock stretching past the edge of comfort and into a jolting ache all up Squalo’s spine. Squalo jerks, arches himself into a choked-off burst of sound, and Xanxus  _purrs_ , rumbling satisfaction as his hips thrust forward and closer.

“Better,” Xanxus says, as if Squalo’s sudden incoherence is intentional and not wholly reflexive, and draws back to slide in again, deeper this time. Squalo can feel the edge of Xanxus’s pants catching against his skin, glancing friction to complement the burn of heat inside him, the fire rippling through his blood to take over his body. His head is dipped down, dragging under its own weight; after a moment he manages to free his white-knuckled grip on the edge of the couch to close his fingers around the ache in his own cock, but his movements are clumsy and jerky, as if he’s trying to coordinate someone else’s action instead of his own. It doesn’t really matter anyway; the pressure is enough, the awkward friction urging sensation over his skin in harmony with Xanxus’s rough movements inside him, and Squalo doesn’t recognize the broken-open sounds he’s making and he can’t stop, they’re tearing out of him in time with every inhale he musters.

Xanxus reaches out to tangle his fingers into Squalo’s hair. For a moment he has a grasp, a tight enough fist to use as a handle to drag the other back; then his hand slips, the strands unwinding themselves under the force. Xanxus makes a sound, a growl of anger this time, and his fingers land at the back of Squalo’s neck instead, printing bruises over the top of the other’s spine as he pulls.

“Your hair’s too short,” Xanxus says, the words fire in the air.

“I’ll grow it out,” Squalo says, too-fast and too-desperate but he can’t think straight, his body is arching taut and he can’t feel the tips of his fingers for the heat collecting in his chest, like all his attention is zeroing in on the friction turning him into a flame and ignoring the rest. “I won’t cut it until you own the city, until you own  _Japan_.”

It takes him a moment to identify the sound humming in the air as a laugh. It sounds like a growl, at first, then like an earthquake shuddering through the floor under them. It’s only when Xanxus fucks into him with a sudden thrust hard enough to skid Squalo forward over the edge of the couch that he realizes it’s amusement in the other’s throat, the grate of delight spilling itself into the air.

“Scum,” he says again, but it sounds amused, now, lacking the edge of disdain it started out with. He’s moving faster, now, setting a pace too quick for Squalo to keep up with; Squalo can’t breathe, can’t find it in him to care about petty things like oxygen. “What’s your name?”

Squalo sucks in a lungful of air, fighting for coherency around the white haze settling over his vision and swamping the corners of his awareness. “Squalo.”

“ _Squalo_ ,” Xanxus repeats, judgment harsh on the sound. “What the hell kind of a name is that?”

“Italian,” Squalo says, his voice detaching from his awareness, the drag of his hand over himself going distant and unthinking. “It means shark.”

Xanxus laughs again. Squalo can feel the vibration purr up the whole length of his spine, like the sound is being carried on the forward thrust of Xanxus’s hips. “Shark,” he says. “I like that,” and when he pushes forward again Squalo jerks, and shouts, and comes in a rush over his desperate-tight hold on himself. The heat jolts through him, waves of satisfaction pulsing sticky and hot against his fingers, and Xanxus grunts a noise of incoherent reaction over him, rocks forward in one more long stroke before he rumbles a sigh and goes still, the tension of expectation spilling itself into languid shudders Squalo imagines he can feel all through his bones and blood.

There’s a moment of silence, after, nothing but the sound of heavy breathing hanging in the air between them. Even when Xanxus takes a breath it’s only to sigh satisfaction before he pushes Squalo forward and lets his cock slide free of the other’s body.

“Shitty shark,” he says, his hand trailing heat against the curve of Squalo’s spine before he draws back. Squalo can hear the sound of fabric shifting as Xanxus pulls his clothes back into place, footsteps as he moves back across the floor; when he looks up Xanxus is settling back into his chair, resuming the same loose-limbed sprawl he had originally and fixing his steady stare on Squalo still half-dressed over the back of the couch.

It takes Squalo a few minutes to straighten himself to upright, to pull his clothes back over sticky-flushed skin and drag himself back to some kind of decency, and Xanxus doesn’t look away for any of it.


	3. Petty

“ _Boss_!”

Squalo’s shout is loud, at a volume sufficient to echo off adjacent buildings if he were outside and hitting an ear-piercing level in the semi-enclosed space of the hideout. It’s more than enough to merit some kind of a response, a growl or an answering yell, but the silence he gets in return is no surprise, no more than he has learned to expect over the past few months.

It’s not like it’s a problem. Squalo knows where Xanxus is, where Xanxus  _always_  is; the shout is more to fire his blood into flame, to urge his energy high and sparking until when he throws open the door to Xanxus’s room he’s itching all through his blood for the fight he’d never pick with Xanxus directly.

“Hey,” Squalo growls across the room as Xanxus lifts his chin minimally to stare at him with eyes the color of blood and fire. “I’ve been calling for you.” He lets the door slam itself shut behind him, strides into the room with long steps that feel as much like the prelude to a fight as the aggression in his voice. “I have news to report.”

Xanxus doesn’t answer. Xanxus never answers, never does anything more than stare at him with his eyes cast into shadows and his mouth an unreadable line. Squalo keeps talking anyway.

“There’s another pair of recruits that look promising,” he says, coming in too close alongside the arm of Xanxus’s chair, where he’s near enough to reach out and touch Xanxus’s sleeve or shoulder if he wanted to. “They’re both a pain in the ass to work with but they seem effective. Say they’ve taken out a few of the Bureau members on their own before they heard we were looking for people like them and came to check us out.” Squalo moves around to the front of Xanxus’s chair, pacing with the nervous energy that has become second nature to him, like the electricity in his blood has settled into the level of instinct, and still speaking aloud as much to himself as for Xanxus’s benefit. “Most of the refugees are just looking for a roof over their heads,” he scoffs, waving a hand to sweep aside the useless masses they have to deal with in ever-increasing numbers. “But these two might have some potential. We need to be able to take down any group from the Bureau we run into on trips into the city.”

Xanxus’s movement comes with no warning at all. Squalo can only see him in his periphery; with the angle of his vision and the candle-light dim illumination in the room, the sudden shift of Xanxus’s arm swinging up and towards him comes too quickly for him to respond. The impact slams against his back, knocks him stumbling forward to his knees, and then Xanxus is moving, leaning forward in his chair to loom his shadow over Squalo’s features when he looks up with a hiss of reflexive protest.

“Shitty shark,” Xanxus growls, that low note of resonance that sparks fire through Squalo’s blood, and his arm swings back around, the back of his hand connecting with the side of Squalo’s face with a  _crack_. The impact is startling, the burst of pain so unexpected Squalo’s vision whites out for a moment of reaction, and by the time he can see again Xanxus’s hand is in his hair, his fingers knotting into a fist in the shoulder-length strands. “You promised me the  _city_.”

“I will--” Squalo starts, but Xanxus ignores him, pulls back on his hair until his neck is strained backwards, until he can feel the ache of hurt spreading all across his scalp like Xanxus’s touch has turned his skin to fire.

“Don’t waste my time with petty details.” Xanxus is leaning forward, now, the threat of his approach enough to tilt Squalo’s shoulders down, to arch his back in a reflexive attempt to back away from the darkness in Xanxus’s eyes, from the ever-present rage written into the set of his jaw. “All I want to know is  _when_.”

“Soon,” Squalo says. Xanxus is leaning in closer; all Squalo can see of his face is the dark of his hair and the glitter of his eyes in the darkness. His throat is going hot under the spill of Xanxus’s breathing over his skin. “Stupid boss, I can’t take over the city in a few  _weeks_.”

“Don’t waste my time,” Xanxus says. His fingers tighten, his mouth lowers; lips skim Squalo’s throat to drag heat against his skin. Squalo can feel a groan pool liquid on his tongue, slide hot past his lips as Xanxus growls something against his throat that starts out as irritation and turns itself inside-out into a purr by the end.

“Damn you,” Squalo says to the ceiling, the words twisting themselves around the sound of another groan as Xanxus’s teeth catch at his collarbone and bite bruises and the edge of blood into his skin. “You shitty boss.”

They both hear the obedience under the words.


	4. Promises

“Tell me,” Xanxus orders from the end of the bed. His voice is dark, rough and as shadowed as the corners of the night-dim room, offering the suggestion of illumination without any sincerity. “You said you had a plan.”

“Stupid boss,” Squalo growls, fingers tightening into fists on the sheets under him. He’s on his hands and knees, head tipped down so he can’t see Xanxus’s expression; his bare skin prickles chill in the air, the awareness of his own exposure as much part of the sensation as the actual temperature of the room around him. “I told you already.”

“Shut up,” Xanxus says. “I want to hear it now. Tell me.” Fingers wrap into Squalo’s hair, tangle into knots that Squalo will have to work out on his own later; when Xanxus pushes Squalo’s head dips forward, his neck curving under a force strong enough to make him hiss in instinctive pain. “You promised me the city.”

“I can give you the Bureau,” Squalo says, staring at the sheets under him, at the dark of the fabric contrasting with the pale of his legs. “They’ve been tracking us for weeks, they’ll throw the entire force at us if we come at them all at once.”

“Scum,” Xanxus says, the word dipping so low and so dark it sounds almost like a purr, almost like affection. His fingers shift, his grip settling around the back of Squalo’s head to pin him in place. When he pushes Squalo tips forward, has to give up on the brace of his locked-out elbows to slide down to lean against his forearms instead. “How are we supposed to fight them?”

“Our team is talented,” Squalo says, the irritated heat of his words catching on the sheets under him instead of igniting the air. Xanxus’s other hand is closing against his knee and pushing his stance open; his weight slips against the expensive-slick sheets, his legs spreading wider than is comfortable. He can feel the strain up against the inside of his thighs, the ache unwinding itself into his hips. “The core group is of far better quality than the shitty Bureau recruits fresh out of high school.”

“The  _core group_.” Xanxus’s hand drags up Squalo’s leg, trails a path of heat before it pulls away. There’s silence for a moment, the sound of Xanxus sucking his fingers into wet the only noise; then his touch is back, scorching Squalo into a shudder of anticipation as rough fingertips drag against his skin. “A handful of runaways against the entire System.”

“The System is rotten, they’re useless,” Squalo insists, and Xanxus’s fingers push into him, forcing him open and jarring air from his lungs into a groan. “ _Fuck_.”

Xanxus’s hand at Squalo’s head shoves down, forces his face against the sheets. “Shut up.” He holds Squalo still while he thrusts deeper, until Squalo can feel the whole length of Xanxus’s fingers inside him; it’s only then that he lets the pressure go, gives Squalo enough leeway to lift his head and gasp a shuddering breath of air to fill overheated lungs.

“We can take them,” Squalo manages, fighting for composure as Xanxus’s touch draws back and slides forward again to spark his vision white and hazy. “The main group can make it to the offices, we can use the rest to hold off any counterattack while we take out the leaders.” Xanxus’s hand shifts, presses in against him; Squalo’s throat closes up against a choking moan, his cock jumping into heat in the periphery of his vision. His blood feels like steam. “We...we can do it, we’ll take the Bureau and we’ll take the city too.”

“The city,” Xanxus repeats, the sincerity of Squalo’s words turning to mockery on his tongue. His fingers draw back, his hand at the other’s head lifts away. Squalo takes a breath, feels the burn in his spread-wide legs, the tremor of anticipation running up his thighs and down his spine. He must be visibly trembling, there’s no way Xanxus can’t see the shake running across his shoulders, but the other offers no comment; his hands are bracing against Squalo’s ass instead, thumbs digging into the soft skin to spread him open for the other’s view. “I don’t want this shitty city.” His cock catches at Squalo’s entrance, the head slipping on the slick of pre-come for a moment; then he’s thrusting forward, the motion stretching Squalo open, and Squalo’s groaning against the sheets, his head dropping down to press against the mattress of his own accord, this time.

“That’s fine,” he says against the dark of the blankets as the friction overwhelms him, the burn enough to be pain if he could remember how to tell the difference between pleasure and hurt. “You can destroy it if you want, once it’s yours you can do what you want with it.” Xanxus draws back, presses forward again, deeper this time, and it’s heat made words that topples from Squalo’s mouth, a promise he didn’t intend pushed out of him by Xanxus’s friction working him warm from the inside out. “I’ll give you the  _country_.”

“Scum,” Xanxus says, but he’s purring now, or Squalo thinks he is; it’s hard to tell as the other man finds a rhythm to the thrust of his hips, a slow, heavy motion that feels inexorable, that pushes heat so deep inside Squalo he can feel it surging into his lungs with every gasping inhale. “What makes you think you  _can_?”

“It’s for you,” Squalo says, bracing his hand against the bed to steady himself against Xanxus’s languid movement into him. “Whatever it takes, I’ll do it for you.”

“Shitty shark” and Xanxus  _is_  pleased, now, Squalo can hear the satisfaction on his tongue even before one of the hands on him eases and draws away to drag around his hip instead. Xanxus’s fingers closing on his cock are almost too rough, the pressure too much to parse as pleasure for the first jolt of sensation, but it doesn’t matter; it’s the heat Squalo’s after more than physical satisfaction anyway, and he has enough of that to incinerate him. “Dedicating yourself to other people is stupid.”

“I don’t care,” Squalo says around the burn sweeping his blood, the friction taking over the motion of his tongue. If he tilts his chin down he can see Xanxus’s fingers on him, can watch the casual grip of the other’s hand stroking up over the flushed weight of his cock. “Stupid boss, I don’t  _care_.”

“Scum,” Xanxus growls, affection weird and electric in the air, and his fingers twist up around Squalo’s cock, drag sensation up along the length of it and press overwhelming heat against the head. Squalo’s spine arches, his lungs swelling on a gasp of air he didn’t intend, and when Xanxus jerks over him again he comes in a sudden convulsive rush, his body arching itself into the taut strain of relief as his vision goes white, as his breathing burns itself into a stuttered groan of satisfaction on his lips. It’s too much, the heat and the friction and the waves of sensation, and Xanxus isn’t stopping, the slide of his cock is driving electricity into Squalo’s blood even when he’s fallen limp and trembling with exhausted relief against the bed.

“Fuck,” Squalo gasps, his heart pounding into overdrive in his chest, his lungs working themselves into hyperventilation as the friction turns itself over, twists from pleasure to the pain of too-much and back again, his nerve endings uncertain how to react to the heat when they’re still raw and aching from the first rush of sensation. “ _Fuck_.”

“Shut up,” Xanxus says again, but he sounds distracted, more like the demand is habitual than sincere, and he’s moving faster, his strokes taking on the harder rhythm that he favors for himself rather than the slower pace that brings Squalo shuddering over the edge quickest. Squalo’s hand is knotted on the sheets, his fingers cramping with the force of his hold, and every inhale is fire in his throat, every heartbeat surges heat into his veins; he thinks he’s going hard again, his blood making an effort to push him back to arousal, but Xanxus is letting him go, is reaching up for his head again instead of his cock. Fingers touch his hair, the stick of Squalo’s come on Xanxus’s skin catching the tangled strands, and then Xanxus is pushing him down again, the force of his fingers tight against Squalo’s skull enough to shove the other down against the suffocating texture of the sheets.

Squalo can’t see, can’t breathe, can’t think straight; there’s just heat, fire so intense it melts even time out-of-focus and dripping molasses-slow, until it feels like forever he’s been here, like this, sucking desperate inhales against too-warm sheets as Xanxus fucks him into the soft of the mattress supporting him. Then there’s a growl over him, a groan as much satisfaction as anger, and Squalo has one shudder of anticipatory tension before Xanxus thrusts forward and comes in a surge of heat as violent as his motions ever are. Squalo makes a sound against the sheets, half moan and half gasp, and Xanxus’s hold on him eases, goes slack and almost gentle in the first distraction of his orgasm. Squalo thinks he can feel the bruises, the print of Xanxus’s fingers against the pale of his skin; the thought makes him shudder as much as the last jolt of friction as Xanxus pulls out of him to drop boneless and sprawling over the bed.

“The country,” Xanxus says in the vague direction of the ceiling, his eyes shut and expression slack and almost-relaxed with the heat in his blood. “Is that what you’re going to give me?”

Squalo slides down to lie across the bed, to let the mattress support his weight instead of his knees. The sheets are sticky under him and cling to his skin when he turns sideways, but it’s not worth the effort to move, not when Xanxus has all the purring pleasure of physical contentment audible under his voice.

“Yeah,” he says, watching the candlelight turn Xanxus’s eyelashes to charcoal, watching the flicker of illumination outline creases of long-held anger, lines of fury etched too deep for present relaxation to undo. “I told you, stupid boss, weren’t you listening?”

Xanxus reaches out without opening his eyes. His arm falls across Squalo’s shoulder, the boneless weight of it enough to bear Squalo down to the bed even before fingers twist into his hair to shove his head down too.

“Shut up, scum.” Xanxus orders him. He smells like smoke, gunpowder and bonfires and smouldering coals kept too-long repressed. “I’m sleeping.”

Squalo takes a breath, inhales smoke onto his tongue and fire into his lungs, and he doesn’t speak again.


	5. Still

It wasn’t supposed to be like this.

Squalo doesn’t know what went wrong. They had a plan, a strategy so straightforward even the idiots that comprise most of the group should have been able to keep the steps clear in their head. It should have been a clean process of deliberately triggering pre-set traps, of walking past distractions they set themselves and were ready for; they should have been in the Bureau by now, climbing the stairs to the main offices with Squalo at Xanxus’s shoulder to take out whatever final defenses the department had in place. Instead they’re out on the streets, bolting from the Inspectors and Enforcers that  _should_  be distracted by the rest of their attack force, by the foot soldiers who are instead doing god-knows-what and ruining Squalo’s plans and their chances at once.

“We need to fall back,” Squalo says in the moment of breathless calm they’ve won for themselves by the expedience of ducking into an alley while Xanxus empties the clips for his guns and shoves new magazines into the weapon without looking up. “Someone screwed up, we need to fall back and take stock of what we have.”

“No,” Xanxus says, cocking the gun in his hand with a heavy  _click_  Squalo can feel jolt down his spine with the weight of inevitability.

“Stop,” Squalo insists as Xanxus pushes past him towards the end of the alley. His hand comes out of its own accord, closes against the tension turning Xanxus’s wrist into a wall and leaving no space for gentleness anywhere along his arm. “Xanxus,  _stop_.”

Xanxus jerks his hand free as easily as if Squalo wasn’t holding him at all, without even looking up. Squalo just has time to see the blow coming, to turn his head half-away from the weight of the impact before Xanxus’s hand smacks across his face, the force granted extra weight by the handle of the gun still in his grip. Squalo’s vision falls into starburst-white for a moment, his feet stumbling as his balance wavers, and by the time he has brought his vision back into focus his mouth is full of blood.

“Don’t tell me what to do,” Xanxus says over him, voice rumbling threat without a suggestion of apology. Squalo spits red against the pavement, the crimson of the blood from his torn lip spattering the dark asphalt with a smear of color to be washed away by the next rain. “Scum.”

“Stupid boss,” Squalo hisses. His lip is aching, offering a dull throb of distraction as it swells with the injury, but that’s not what’s weighting his chest, not what’s pressing against his ribs until he can’t get a breath. When he looks up it’s only to see the back of Xanxus’s head, to watch the dark of his hair tangling itself against the collar of his jacket. “This is  _suicide_.”

“Shut up,” Xanxus says without turning around, and steps forward and out of the cover of the alley.

Squalo moves as fast as he can. He’s stumbling forward before he has his balance again, before he has his gun raised and ready for combat, but there’s no time to hesitate, not when Xanxus is turning towards the bursts of blue light, lifting his gun and facing down the shots from the Dominators as if they are the light they appear and nothing more. His eyes flash bright in comparison, the sickly shine of the Dominators enough to set Xanxus’s red aflame in counterpoint, and Squalo is yelling, sound pouring up from his throat like water from a drowning man’s lungs, wordless and pointless except for the way it turns his blood to fire, the way it brings his gun up and pulls his shoulders around to face the Enforcers firing at them instead of to watch Xanxus burn bright as Squalo’s ever seen him.

Squalo doesn’t think about dodging the rays of blue coming towards him. He’s not thinking at all, really, unless it’s about the manic grin he can see forming in his periphery, or about the jolt of recoil that hits his wrists with every squeeze of the trigger under his fingers. Dodging comes naturally, the fluidity of instinct taking over his legs and shoulders, dipping him under the shots and around the attempts of the useless Bureau members to take him down. For a moment escape seems possible again, the idea forming that they might even make it out of this moment and on into at least the next fight, the next five minutes as far as Squalo’s imagination can go.

Then Xanxus makes a strange sound, a grunt that cuts off sharply like his throat has locked up, and Squalo knows everything is over before he’s even turned.

The light has faded, evaporated as soon as it hit, but Xanxus has gone still, is falling with all the heavy elegance of his usual motion locked down by the bolt from the Dominator. For a moment Squalo has the horrible thought that his Coefficient might have been too high, that he might have been hit by an Eliminator instead of a Paralyzer; but there’s no spray of blood, no explosion of crimson, and Squalo’s lungs catch air again, fill with a gasp of relief for this one small mercy before his vision goes blue, his own limbs locking into stillness for the moment before the Paralyzer shot drags him down into unconsciousness.


	6. Negotiate

Squalo is waiting when his visitor arrives.

It’s not that he’s expecting anyone. It’s not that he’s expecting  _anything_. It’s more that there’s nothing left to do but wait -- for something to change, for Xanxus to come back, for death if that’s all that’s left to him. The holding cells are too small to allow for more than a few strides of pacing, even if he wanted to move, and there’s nothing in them; everything they are allowed comes through requests, and Squalo lacks the motivation to even think of anything to ask for, other than the weapons he already knows he won’t be allowed or the man as much a prisoner as himself. He’s not even sure how long it’s been -- hours, at least, probably days, maybe a week or more -- when there’s movement outside the field that makes up one side of his cell, the fluidity of human motion instead of the automatons that offer pre-approved items that Squalo hasn’t requested and doesn’t want.

“Hey there.” The voice is irritating, too sweet and too friendly, like the speaker is trying too hard to be nice or maybe is just an idiot. “You’re...Squalo, right?”

Squalo lifts his head by an inch, just enough to turn the flattest stare he can manage on his visitor. It’s a young man with a tangle of blond curls and the dark of a too-familiar jacket; Squalo can recognize the pattern and cut of Inspector’s uniforms even when they’re not near enough for him to make out the Bureau logo printed over the shoulders. Squalo looks at the jacket instead of the attempt at a smile the other is giving him; it seems more appropriate. Whatever it is his visitor wants, it can’t be anything good.

“Hm.” There’s a rustle of papers, the blond checking something in his hands; then he sighs and steps in closer towards the wall. “You must be who I’m looking for. I don’t think there’s too many latent criminals in here with hair like that.” He’s smiling again; Squalo can hear the expression even if he’s not looking to see it. “I have a proposition for you.”

“Don’t care,” Squalo grates without looking up. There’s no aggression to the words; he can’t find any heat for them, not with the icy chill of a vacuum in his chest, not with all his borrowed fire stolen away.

“Aww, come on!” The Inspector leans in against the clear wall, tilting himself into a stance Squalo is quite sure is intended as friendly and approachable. It prickles discomfort along Squalo’s spine, reminds him that he can’t get out, that he’s trapped in this prison with no chance of escaping this idiot’s forced attempts at affability, that  _Xanxus_  is trapped here too, somewhere, that what is bad for Squalo must be worse for Xanxus, Xanxus who was never meant for walls or cities or humanity. “Don’t you at least want to hear what I have to offer?”

“I don’t care,” Squalo repeats. He lets his gaze drop off the Inspector’s coat and land at his hands instead. They look empty without a weapon in them, slack and useless and  _weak_ , like he’s truly become the scum Xanxus always called him. “Fuck your shitty Bureau.”

There’s a sigh, heavy and drawn-out enough that Squalo can hear the insincerity under it even before the Inspector speaks.

“That’s too bad,” he says, and he’s straightening, tugging at the sleeves of his coat with a gesture that looks oddly childish for someone supposed to be representing the Public Safety Bureau in what is obviously a negotiation of some kind. “I was hoping you’d want something better than staying in prison the rest of your life.”

Squalo’s laugh is harsh, tearing raw in his throat on the bitter burn of loss in his chest. It’s nice to know that he can still feel  _something_ , at least. “You  _hoped_ ,” he spits to the floor. “You’re a damn idiot if you think I ever cared what happened to me.”

“Xanxus.”

The sound of that name goes through Squalo like electricity. His lungs tense, flex hard on the air he hasn’t really been breathing until now, and when he looks up it’s in a rush of impulse, staring wide-eyed at the Inspector before he can think to cling to his facade of disinterest. Xanxus isn’t there, of  _course_  Xanxus isn’t there, but the Inspector’s expression has shifted dramatically, his childish smile entirely replaced by a flat line of calculation at his lips.

“ _What_?” Squalo snaps, because all his body is tensing with anticipation of  _something_  and he can’t let it turn into hope, not yet. “What the  _fuck_  does he have to do with  _any_  of this?”

“That’s what you care about,” the Inspector says, and it’s not a question. “You can’t help him by sulking in here for the rest of your life.”

Squalo doesn’t bother with denying this misrepresentation of his behavior. “How?” he demands. He can feel secondhand fire surging into his veins, something too scorching to be hope and far more valuable for his purposes. “What do you  _want_?”

The Inspector turns to face Squalo straight-on. He looks older when he’s not smiling, stronger with his shoulders squared; his eyes aren’t amused at all anymore, just dark and steady and absolutely self-assured. Something in his expression reminds Squalo very vaguely of the way Xanxus looked when he stepped out of the alley that last time, exudes some of the bone-deep self-confidence Squalo’s never been able to find alone.

“Join the Bureau,” the Inspector says, clear and careful and precise. “I’ve already put in a request for you to join as an Enforcer; your Coefficient is low enough they should let you out on probation within the month. We can make good use of you in my department.”

“What about the boss?” Squalo growls, because he can’t trust his voice on Xanxus’s name, can’t be sure he has the right to frame those syllables on his lips.

The Inspector takes a breath. “We can’t bring him into the Department yet,” he says, and Squalo has to bite back the hiss of rage that surges into his chest because that last  _yet_  sounds like a  _maybe_. “His Coefficient’s too high, there’s no way I can get approval for him to join even as an Enforcer. He’ll need to bring his Coefficient down before they’ll let him out.”

“ _What_ ,” Squalo says, and he’s on his feet now, he’s lunging forward towards the clear wall with all Xanxus’s borrowed rage flaring in his veins to break like a wave against the barrier. “You want to  _ruin_  him.”

The Inspector doesn’t even flinch. It’s impressive, Squalo notes distantly, or would be if he had space in his head to be impressed. “Do you think he’s that weak?” he asks, and Squalo’s heart stutters, his fire guttering out on lack of fuel. “ _I_ wouldn’t follow someone who would break that easily.”

“The boss won’t  _break_ ,” Squalo says, and he knows he’s being manipulated but there’s freedom on the other side of the wall, traction for a deal his desperation is clamoring to make. “Let him out and you’ll see for your own damn self.”

“Make something useful of yourself,” the Inspector counters. “If you join the Bureau you can be waiting for him when he’s released.” He takes a step back across the narrow width of the hallway made uncrossable by the wall in front of Squalo. “You’ll never see him again if you stay here.”

Squalo would like to claim that his decision is made objectively, that he weighs the pros and cons without the influence of selfish emotion. But in truth all it takes is a moment to imagine the Inspector’s scenario, a heartbeat’s time of contemplating the cold bleakness of a future alone, and then the frozen panic in his veins makes the decision for him.

“I’ll do it,” Squalo says.


	7. Magnetism

Hair takes a long time to grow.

Squalo considers this, every so often, as his hair lengthens from even with his chin to past his shoulderblades, along the curve of his waist and down to his hips. The first few inches he could count to the week, every hour that passed stretching long and heavy with tangible weight against his scalp, but the longer his hair grew the easier the time went, until a half-year’s worth of growth is something he barely even notices in the mirror. With such gradual change he learns to work around it too; what would be a distraction for someone else becomes unthinking habit, the toss of his head to sweep his hair aside as much part of the motion of combat as raising his Dominator into alignment on the target. It’s soothing, in its way, the routine of his existence as least as comforting as it is stifling, until the weight of consciousness is one he bears without thinking, the coals he keeps banked smouldering so low he doesn’t feel their heat for days at a time.

And then he is twenty-four.

His hair is a weight across his back, the locks so long they stay out of his face without being held back with the hairties he adopted for a few years. It’s a relief to be spared the bother, even if he has to sweep the length of it aside before he sits to avoid tangling himself in the white; that is an inconvenience he can live with, that he _will_  live with, because the alternative of breaking his vow is too impossible to even consider.

“Aren’t you nearly done with that?” is what he snarls this morning, aiming the irritation across the table at Levi, an Inspector too weak-willed and malleable to stand up to Enforcers as he ought. “I don’t have all day to be waiting on you.”

“Don’t be so mean to him, Squalo,” Lussuria lilts over Levi’s low rumble of not-quite protest. The sing-song tone is far more irritating than anything Levi might offer, offers the friction Squalo wants to strike a spark this morning, to remind himself why he’s here, why this is a better alternative than the narrow cells the latent criminals are kept to.

“ _You_ \--” he starts, and then the door opens, and it’s Dino’s voice falling too bright and too cheerful over them.

“Morning everyone!” is how he starts, as always. Squalo doesn’t look up; Lussuria is pouting at him, and he doesn’t need visual confirmation to know that Dino is sloppily dressed again, probably with his jacket undone or forgotten entirely, as happens on more-than-monthly basis. “I hope you’re ready for a new department member!”

“ _Great_ ,” Squalo says with all the irritated sarcasm he can muster, kicking against the edge of his desk to turn towards the door. “Finally got your transfer request approved?” He has to reach up to shove his hair back from his face, bring his chin up to offer the greetings of a glare to the newest addition; after years of effort, it’s not much of a surprise that Dino has finally won his favorite Enforcer for his department. Squalo is opening his mouth for a growl, or a shout maybe, something suitably aggressive to offer as not-a-greeting to Hibari Kyoya from Department Ten as he comes through the doorway; and then he sees broad shoulders, a curtain of hair not heavy enough to hide the spark of crimson in the eyes behind it, and all thoughts of Hibari, and Lussuria, and Dino, evaporate out of Squalo’s head at the same moment his lungs empty in a rush of startled sound.

Xanxus looks the same as Squalo remembers. It’s strange, to see how untouched by the years he appears when Squalo can feel the weight of all his pressing against his shoulders and falling along his spine. But Xanxus is the same, or maybe it’s that Squalo’s never really seen anything but the fire still smouldering hot and unfettered behind the dark of his eyes. Dino is speaking, some kind of introductions completely pointless because Squalo doesn’t need them, and Xanxus is looking around the room, his eyes sweeping out everything as  _his_  on sight regardless of his ostensible role. He looks at Lussuria, at Levi, at the desk in the corner Dino usually takes and the pair of unused spaces against the wall, giving the other department members as much non-consideration as he does the furniture.

And then his gaze lands on Squalo.

Squalo’s heart seizes. He’s not sure what he’s feeling, if it’s tears burning against his eyes or joy tightening in his chest, if it’s pleasure or fear or anticipation or awkwardness that is seizing all his body motionless. All he can do is meet Xanxus’s stare, listen to the rhythm of his pulse echoing loud in his ears as he opens his mouth and croaks “ _Boss_ ,” sounding half-strangled on the nameless emotion choking his usual echoing volume.

Xanxus’s head comes up, his chin tilting barely enough to let his hair fall back from his face. It makes him look larger, expands the breadth of his shoulders to fill the space, and Squalo thinks for a moment that there’s no air left in the room, that all the oxygen has burned itself to fire in the space between his eyes and Xanxus’s. And then Xanxus’s mouth twitches, the corner of his lips turning up into the faintest suggestion of a smile.

“Shitty shark,” Xanxus says, and when Squalo breathes in the air is achingly warm in his lungs.

Squalo is twenty-four, and he’s found his direction again.


	8. White

The first thing Xanxus reaches for is Squalo’s hair.

He sprawls over Squalo’s bed as soon as they’re back in the other’s quarters, spreading his knees wide to dominate the furniture, and when he focuses his stare on the other Squalo doesn’t need to be told what to do. He strips off his jacket, shirt, slacks, takes himself down to bare skin while Xanxus watches without a flicker of either appreciation or judgment on his face. There’s just that steady attention, heat no less blistering for the years apart, until Squalo’s more than half-hard by the time he’s kicking his clothes aside and coming back in towards the bed. His hair feels strange against his bare skin, suddenly heavy with Xanxus’s gaze on him, until the sleek fall of it slipping over his hip as he climbs onto the bed to straddle Xanxus’s legs is almost startling. Xanxus doesn’t shove him off as Squalo half-expected, doesn’t reach for his hip to tip him over and flat onto his back; he just watches Squalo approach, his eyes tracking the other’s movements with barely the flicker of a blink to indicate that he’s even conscious. His arms are crossed over his chest, the impatience of dominance weighting his shoulders, and Squalo doesn’t wait for permission before he stretches sideways to retrieve the slick bottle he needs. The liquid spills over his fingers, cool against the stoked fire under his skin, and when he reaches around behind himself Xanxus leans back by an inch, letting himself slouch into consideration that sets Squalo alight with anticipation.

Squalo’s movement comes easy. It’s a difficult angle even at the best of times, the harder for his lack of any but very occasional practice over the last few years, but his skin is warm, is hot, is aching for the friction his fingers can grant him. And Xanxus is watching him, eyes unreadable but focused on his face, until Squalo feels like every flicker of reaction that tenses across his forehead or twists the corner of his mouth is a tangle of words, meaning telegraphed directly for Xanxus’s unflinching observation.

“Fuck,” he says, ducking his head as he slides a finger into himself, as he gasps a choking lungful of air that fires against the inside of his chest. “Stupid boss” as his cock jerks hotter, flushing itself to interest as he dips farther, pressing in against the heat that has been kindled in his blood. Xanxus just keeps watching, mouth flat and voice silent, not even flinching when Squalo has to reach out and brace himself against the wall over his shoulder. Squalo draws his hand back, tries another stroke, and it’s easier, this time, even against the anticipation thrumming his body into one long ache of need. His hair shifts with the movement of his shoulders, the strands slipping against his arm and down to catch against Xanxus’s shirt, and it’s then that Xanxus finally unfolds his arms and reaches up to catch the trailing lock against callused fingers.

“Your hair’s long,” he says, obvious observation made suggestion by the growl in his throat. He’s looking at Squalo’s hair, now, not at his face, and Squalo looks down too, watches Xanxus’s fingers wind the pale of his hair into loops against his touch.

“I told you I wouldn’t cut it,” Squalo says, angling his hand to jolt a burst of electricity down his spine. “Not until the country is yours.”

“Scum,” Xanxus says, and reaches up to dig his fingers into the hair falling heavy against the back of Squalo’s neck, to make a fist of the weight and drag pain all across Squalo’s scalp. “The country’s not mine.”

“And I haven’t cut my hair,” Squalo growls right back. He has to tilt his head to Xanxus’s pull; the force is too much for him to resist, the burn of the hurt too much to keep his body resistant. His head goes back, baring his throat for the fire of Xanxus’s stare; he draws his hand back, thrusts in with the stretch of a second finger. “I keep my damn promises, shitty boss.”

“Yeah?” Xanxus pulls his hand farther, reaches out to grab at more of Squalo’s hair; Squalo thinks he might have most of it in his fingers, now, the strands tangling themselves into knots against the texture of his palms. “You’re stupid too.”

Squalo’s laugh comes out strained, tense against the angle of his throat and hot on sincerity. “I don’t care,” he says, and he’s not ready but he can’t wait anymore, the awkward rhythm of his hand isn’t enough to reach the angle he needs. He draws his fingers free of himself, reaches out to grab at Xanxus’s shoulder to steady his balance before he thinks; he’s expecting a yell, a growl, a smack, some kind of protest at this sudden unprompted contact. But Xanxus doesn’t speak, barely seems to notice the touch at all; he’s letting Squalo’s hair go to reach for his pants instead, thumbing the button open one-handed so he can push the edge down enough to free his cock from the confines of the fabric. Squalo’s looking down, then, dragging against the tension at his hair in spite of the resulting ache, and Xanxus purrs something low and wordless and dark, a threat and a promise and a confession at the same time.

“Scum,” he says again, and it  _is_  an endearment, it’s rumbling itself into affection as his fingers dig into Squalo’s hip to draw him closer, to press him in so near he can feel Xanxus’s breathing against his skin, can shudder at the warmth he has been so chilled without all this time. “Shitty shark.” Squalo braces his hand at Xanxus’s shoulder, slides his knees an inch wider, and Xanxus draws him down, urges his center of balance to move an inch, two, until there’s pressure against Squalo’s skin, Xanxus’s heat threatening all the pressure and all the friction he’s craving, everything he’s been aching for for years.

“Boss,” Squalo says, and lets his weight drop down. There’s pressure, heat, a stretch, he can feel himself giving way to Xanxus’s insistence, and then Xanxus is sliding into him, the width of his cock forcing Squalo open in a way his faded memories didn’t warn him for. He hesitates a moment, gasps a breath against the crushing heat bearing down on him; and Xanxus growls, drags at Squalo’s hip as he rolls his own weight up, and they’re coming together all at once, the sudden thrust of heat enough to white out Squalo’s vision into the pleasure-pain of the stretch, the friction enough to swamp all his senses for a shuddering moment of reaction.

“ _Move_ ,” Xanxus’s voice says, the order clear even past the hum in Squalo’s ears, and Squalo gasps and moves. His hand braces hard at Xanxus’s shoulder, his weight comes up by inches, and then he lets himself down again, gravity finishing the movement for him when his breath sticks him out-of-intention again. He moves again immediately, without waiting for another command, and Xanxus rumbles satisfaction, the hand at Squalo’s hip urging him to a rhythm.

“Stupid boss,” Squalo says past the starbursts of white threatening his vision, around the ache of unfamiliar movement collecting along his thighs. He can feel the heat in his veins pooling in his stomach, aching in his cock, but he can’t let Xanxus’s shoulder go, doesn’t trust his balance without the shaking arm he has braced against the wall. It’s enough, anyway, the drag of Xanxus’s length inside him with each movement he takes, the sustained growl of response pouring up Xanxus’s throat. “Give me a minute to adjust, it’s been seven  _years_.”

“Shut up,” Xanxus says, and rocks up to meet the downward slide of Squalo’s hips. Squalo can feel the catch of his pants, the metal of Xanxus’s zipper digging in against his skin hard enough to bruise the pattern of the teeth into the underside of his thigh. “I know how long it’s been.”

“Fuck,” Squalo spits, tipping his head forward. He can smell gunpowder in the air, heat flaring to the threat of an explosion on Xanxus’s skin, can taste the burn of metal on his tongue. “I’ve been waiting for you.”

“Scum,” Xanxus says again, the word a purr, the sound heat. “You should have found me sooner.”

“Damn you,” Squalo says, and he has to duck his head, has to choke on a gasp of air as Xanxus’s fingers curl against the back of his neck to steady him, as Xanxus’s hand eases on his hip to reach for his cock instead. “I did everything I could.”

Xanxus drags over him, fingers pressing texture against Squalo’s skin, surging shuddering fire up his spine. “You said you’d give me the country.”

“I did,” Squalo agrees, and his words are coming hot, turning into liquid in his throat and scorching his tongue like steam. “I still will, I swear it.”

“You swear a lot of things, shitty shark,” Xanxus says, pressing his thumb in against Squalo’s cock and pushing a surge of sensation out into his blood. His hips are rolling up to meet each of Squalo’s strokes, his cock sliding deeper with each thrust; Squalo can’t breathe and doesn’t want to, his arms are winding around Xanxus’s shoulders now instead of bracing at the wall, trusting to the other man instead of mere architecture for support.

“Yeah,” Squalo gasps, his fingers curling into dark hair, his inhales burning his lungs with flame and smoke. “That doesn’t mean I don’t mean them.”

“Shut up,” Xanxus growls, so close Squalo can feel the vibration slide over his lips and trickle down his throat. When he drags his fingers up Squalo can feel the jolt up his spine, electricity knocking him senseless with heat; then Xanxus’s hips drive up, his cock sinks in so deep Squalo can feel it like a blow, and Squalo’s coming, groaning sound and satisfaction so intense it’s hardly even pleasure against the heat of Xanxus’s mouth. It’s like being shaken, like someone else has taken over his body to shudder and quake through each wave of heat that hits him, like each sticky pulse over Xanxus’s painful-tight hold is obedience to some unspoken command on the other man’s lips.

Xanxus doesn’t let go. He holds on, fingers tight on Squalo’s cock and hand fisted into the other’s hair, and when he thrusts up Squalo chokes on his inhale, the friction inside him more than coherency can stand. The rhythm is too fast, the sensation too much, Squalo’s vision is threatening white again and his lungs are dragging for air he can’t manage to hold when Xanxus finally takes a breath loaded with the weight of expectation. His head comes up, his mouth fits against Squalo’s, and when he groans through his orgasm it spills over Squalo’s tongue, burns a brand against the inside of his mouth as Xanxus’s movement gives way to the spill of fire into him.

Squalo lingers, after, when Xanxus has gone still and heavy with languid warmth, the two of them pressed close enough that he can borrow Xanxus’s breath on each exhale. He’s ready for a shove, a growl, a protest as inevitable as death, but what comes instead are fingers easing in his hair, Xanxus’s hold drawing away from his sticky cock to find out the dip of his spine under a curtain of white hair.

“The country,” Xanxus says against his mouth, the hand against Squalo’s head keeping him from pulling back enough to see the color of the other man’s eyes.

Squalo shuts his eyes. “The country,” he repeats, letting himself sag into the hold Xanxus has on him. “I’ll give it to you, boss.”

“You had better,” Xanxus growls, molten and dark, and Squalo can feel his smile. “Scum.”

When Xanxus kisses him, Squalo sees the white heat of electricity behind his shut eyes.


End file.
